The Third Rail mk-3

by Michael Harvey

  CHAPTER 17

  I opened my eyes and looked around my living room. The sound was smal, but certain. I tapped a key on my sleeping computer. The screen pulsed in the dark: 2:06 a.m. I picked up my gun because it felt like the thing to do, walked to my front door, and considered the thin bar of light peeking out from underneath. Then I opened the door. Sitting in the hal way was a plain brown package, no name on it, wrapped in string. I padded down the hal to a smal window looking out over Lakewood. The street was empty. I took the stairs softly, found nothing in the lobby, even less in the basement. I went back upstairs, checking each floor in turn. Whoever my messenger was, he was no longer in the building. I had left the front door ajar. Maggie was in the hal, sniffing at the package.

  “Something to eat, Mags?”

  She gave me a hopeful look and went back inside. I fol owed. The package felt like a book. I cut the string and found it to be exactly that. A copy of the Iliad. I opened it up and found the poem’s opening lines highlighted and circled:

  Sing, goddess, the anger of Peleus’s son Achilles and its devastation, which put pains thousandfold upon the Achaeans…

  I felt around inside the package and found two more items. The first was a cardboard cutout of a train on a black set of tracks, running across a background of yel ow. The second was a smal map of a subway system, with a key taped to it and an address attached. I took a long look at the map and then jumped on the computer. Twenty minutes later, I was driving through Chicago’s sleeping streets, brown package on the front seat beside me. I HELD A FLASHLIGHT in one hand and my gun in the other. The address attached to the key had taken me to the corner of Clinton and Congress. The key opened a CTA access door tucked under the Ike, near the Clinton L station. A couple sets of stairs and a long ramp brought me to a second door and a run of tracks somewhere in Chicago’s subway system. The room itself felt vast. Dul ribbons of steel ran off ahead of me. A string of lights kept the dark canopy above me nailed in place.

  I found a wal and moved along its edge until I came to a smal alcove formed by two concrete pil ars. I stepped just inside and crouched, spreading my map on the ground. Best I could tel, the door I had passed through was marked with a star. Due east was a second spot, marked on the map with a black X and the word BODY in blue Magic Marker.

  I put the map away, took out my gun again, and nudged forward. I’d expected the L’s thunder, imagined maybe even having to duck a couple of trains, but the place was quiet. As if to underscore the point, a low rumble drifted in and away. I stayed close to the wal, my light playing on the steel to my right. Chicago’s trains were powered by an electrified third rail, six hundred volts of direct current. I’d try to keep a healthy distance. Thirty yards farther, I saw the body. It had been dumped in the middle of a rail bed. I stepped careful y across the tracks and squatted close. The woman was wrapped in plastic, dressed in jeans and a Chicago Bears sweatshirt. Her hands were taped behind her back, and it looked like her throat had been cut. There wasn’t much I could do without touching things, so I took a step back, careful to avoid the blood that had pooled underneath. I ran my light up and down the tunnel and wondered why I’d been summoned. Then I stepped off the tracks and found out. The red dot flicked ahead a few feet, then skipped behind me. I dove for a crevice in the subway wal just as a round clipped the concrete somewhere above my head. I hugged the ground hard and lifted my face an inch or so. The red dot danced in the air, inviting me to come out and play. Then it moved up and over my body. Seconds hung, stretched, and fel. Each breath, an exercise in eternity. The shooter was using some sort of low-light targeting scope and a laser, knew exactly where I was, and could take me out at his leisure. I told myself to stay down, crouch deeper into whatever cover I could find, even as I felt myself lift. Whoever he was, he could kil me whether I stood or hid behind my hands. The last part of that equation, however, I could control. So I stood. Then I took a step. I felt the shake in my boots, and took a second step. Another round kicked up maybe a foot to my left. I flinched back into the wal, into cover that was not. Fear churned up and I used it to create resolve. I pushed away from the wal and walked back toward the door from which I’d entered. This time there was a whine and a ribbon of white sparks. A round had caught some steel and ricocheted away.

  Unbidden, the face of an eleven-year-old girl jumped up in my mind. She’d been skipping rope outside a high-rise in the Robert Taylor Homes when a stray round off the pavement caught her in the head. I was a rookie cop and the first unit to respond. Her mom beat on my arms, my face, my badge, my chest. The blood of her daughter covered us both. The girl, however, was past caring.

  I pushed the image away and kept walking alongside the track, edging down the long curved tunnel. I figured maybe he wasn’t going to kil me, unless he just wanted to play a little first. So I kept walking, concentrating on each breath, the rise and spread of my ribs, the feel of the air on my skin, and the grit under my shoes. Then I was at the door, opened and closed behind me. Breath came in a cold rush, flooding my lungs, causing my heart to freeze and thump in my chest. I sat back against a wal and listened. Somewhere above me I heard the echo of a second door opening and closing. The access door at street level. My shooter had just left the building, his point made and received.

  LAKE SHORE DRIVE

  CHAPTER 18

  Robles was up with the sun, drinking coffee and checking his gear. He’d only gotten two hours of sleep, but it would do. Thirty minutes later, he was walking across a soccer field, stiff with morning frost. Robles hefted the bag slung across his shoulders and grunted. The sky was just starting to lighten over the lake, and he could see the cold bil ow as he breathed. A woman and her dog materialized, maybe twenty yards away, jogging slowly down one side of the field. Robles kept his head down as their paths crossed. The jogger moved off the field and disappeared beneath an overpass. Robles waited five minutes. The jogger didn’t return and the field was empty. He moved up a smal incline and down the other side, to a sheltered stretch of ground. Spread out before him were eight lanes of highway, flowing north and south. Lake Shore Drive, dark and quiet, maybe forty-five minutes from rush hour.

  Robles zipped open his duffel and pul ed out a tripod. A couple of cars cruised by, headlights stil on, heading toward the Loop. Robles took out a Nikon D300 SLR camera, fitted it to the tripod, and screwed on a zoom lens. Then he zipped up the bag and stashed it behind a stand of trees to his left. Robles looked through the viewfinder and adjusted the focus. A woman and a smal child popped into view. Robles glanced up. They were coming straight at him, driving an SUV down a nice, long stretch of road. Robles looked back through the viewfinder and counted off the seconds in his head. One, two, three… The woman was smiling and drumming her fingers on the steering wheel. Four, five, six… Robles could just make out the top of the kid’s head above the dashboard. Seven, eight… He looked up again. The SUV blew past in a puff of morning mist. Robles smiled. Perfect. He lensed a few more cars. Got timings for al eight lanes, but focused mostly on the traffic coming toward him. When he was done, Robles snapped a few general photos, wide-angle stuff, just in case anyone happened by and wondered why he was there. A photo documentary project. Then Robles crouched back among the trees and waited. For the traffic to build. And his cel phone to buzz.

  CHAPTER 19

  I woke up and smel ed the coffee. Literal y. There was someone in my house, and they were making a pot of joe. Whoever it was, at least they had the good sense to use my stash of El Diablo beans. Now if they’d only bring me a cup.

  The second time I woke, the smel was stronger and the intruder closer, as in over my bed, cup in hand, smiling. Simply dream and ye shal receive.

  “You’re here,” I said.

  “I let myself in.” Rachel Swenson put my coffee on the night table, leaned in, and kissed me. I’d gotten home at a little after four. I looked at the clock on my nightstand. It read 6:50.

  “You staying or going?” I said.

  “
Going. I’ve got an early meeting.”

  “I’m thinking they can get along without you.”

  Rachel’s smile was fragrant, even as she shook her head no. I ran my hand down her hip and imagined the slightest bit of maybe. That, of course, was the time Rodriguez picked to cal.

  “Hel o,” I said.

  “You sound like hel.”

  “Fuck you. I just woke up.”

  The detective chuckled. “You ready to go?”

  “Go where?”

  “Lawson wants to meet us this morning at the Southport L. They finished processing the scene, but she’s going up for another look.”

  “I told Hubert Russel I’d meet him for coffee.”

  “You bringing him in on this?”

  “Could be. Why don’t you tag along? Save me the trouble of explaining things twice.”

  “Explaining what?”

  “Filter on Milwaukee. You know where it is?”

  “Sure.”

  “Eight a.m. We can talk then.”

  I hung up. Rachel sat down beside me and I held her for a good thirty seconds. If I were smart, we never would have moved.

  “Sounds like we both have ful days,” she said, leaning back and studying my face.

  I hadn’t had time yesterday for anything except a quick phone cal, tel ing her I was involved in the thing at Southport and would explain later. Later, apparently, was now.

  “What do you know?” I said, dropping my head back to the pil ow.

  “Wel, I’m guessing you were the eyewitness the police are talking about in the Southport shooting.”

  “It’s a little more complicated than that.”

  “I’m shocked.”

  “I bet you are.”

  “Fil me in.”

  “I can tel you I’m now attached to the task force working the case.”

  A frown. “Both shootings?”

  I propped myself up on one elbow. “Yeah, they’re connected. Hey, you know Katherine Lawson?”

  Rachel Swenson was probably the smartest person I knew. Certainly the best looking. She was also a sitting judge for the Northern District of Il inois, which meant she knew the feds. Lots of them.

  “Sure. Katherine’s a bit of a star with the Bureau. You working this with her?”

  “I get the feeling I am. Myself and Rodriguez.”

  “That should be interesting.”

  I wanted to pursue how and why Rachel found Agent Lawson so interesting. I also wanted to seriously get Her Honor into bed. Unfortunately, it was getting late for both of us.

  “Let’s make a date,” I said.

  “Dinner?”

  “Tonight. No matter what.”

  “You cooking?”

  “You feeling brave?”

  “Seven o’clock, Kel y.”

  “Bring your appetite, woman.”

  I finished my coffee and swung my feet to the floor. Rachel touched me on the shoulder. “How deep are you in this thing?”

  I heard the twinge in her voice and thought about the night before-my starring role as the duck in a shooting gal ery.

  “It’s a task force, Rach. Probably just sit around a smal office drinking bad coffee.”

  I hustled into the bathroom. Rachel fol owed.

  “You don’t need to lie, Michael.”

  She was leaning against the edge of the door frame. Some part of my brain registered her legs, which were great. The rest of me was in ful avoidance mode.

  “What do you want to hear?” I began to run water in the sink.

  “Real y?”

  “Go ahead.” I bent down and splashed some water around.

  “Law school, Michael? Northwestern, Chicago? You’d love it, you’d be done before you know it, and you’d be a hel of a trial attorney.”

  It was Rachel Swenson’s pet project. Trade my gun for a briefcase. Turn Michael Kel y into Clarence Darrow. I toweled my face dry and escaped back into the bedroom.

  “I like what I do, Rach.” I threw on some jeans and laced up a pair of New Balance 827s. “Even if I’m not any good at it.”

  “You’re very good at it. And that’s not the point.”

  I reached for my gun on the dresser. She caught my empty hand in hers.

  “What is the point?” I said, forcing the question through my teeth.

  CHAPTER 20

  Filter was in a section of the city cal ed Bucktown. The neighborhood got its name from the goats Polish immigrants used to tie up in their front yards. Today the goats are gone, replaced by angst-ridden hipsters, spiked goths, and dewy-eyed emos. Pick a label and throw a blanket over them: what you have are a col ection of just-out-of-col ege types, living in industrial lofts bought with what was left of their dad’s cash, specializing in selfawareness and taking it al very seriously. Think yuppies with tattoos and no sense of humor. I sat at a table near the window. My waitress stumbled her way across the floor on black platform shoes, wearing ripped jeans stuffed to overflowing and a T-shirt that read WE NEVER SLEEP. She was texting on her cel phone as she set down my cup of coffee.

  “Could I get a pierogi with this?”

  The woman nodded and began to wander away. Then she looked up from her phone and wrinkled her nose.

  “A what?” She spoke in that flat, loud, cringe-inducing tone Americans are beloved for the world over.

  “A pierogi. It’s a Polish dumpling.”

  “We don’t have them. We have carrot muffins.”

  I was about to launch into the history of Poles in Chicago, and pierogis in particular, when the waitress’s cel phone came alive in her hand, bleating out the theme song from Sanford and Son. She beamed at her ring-tone choice as if it were a newborn and then returned to the unappetizing prospect of her job… and yours truly.

  “Listen, sir, I have things to do. You want something else?”

  Hubert Russel drifted into view-baggy jeans, red sneakers, and backpack a perfect fit for the Filter vibe.

  “My friend behind you might want something,” I said.

  The waitress rol ed her eyes and flipped open her stil — singing phone. “I’l cal you back.” She hung up without waiting for a response. Then she took Hubert’s order for chai tea and moped away.

  “What did you do to her?” Hubert settled into a chair across from me and pul ed off a chili-red stocking hat. Underneath was a mop of black hair, tied back in a smal ponytail.

  “Nothing. How you doing?”

  “Okay.” Hubert began to unpack what I assumed was a nuclear-powered laptop. He kept his body turned away from me and his head slouched low between his shoulders. I knew there was a problem. Then the light coming through the window shifted and I knew why.

  “What happened to your face?”

  A shiver of anger settled in his jaw. Hubert turned toward me and blinked out of one eye. The other was partial y closed and that was the good news. He had a ragged run of stitches holding together the upper half of his eyelid and swel ed up into his brow. The left side of his lower lip had caught some thread too, and I bet whatever had happened might have cost him some teeth.

  “Was it just fists or something else?” I said.

  “No offense, Mr. Kel y, but I don’t want to talk about this.”

  “Not how things work, Hubert. You look out for your friends. And your friends look out for you.”

  “Maybe I don’t need looking out for?”

  “Real y. You take care of the truck that hit your face?”

  Hubert tried to smile, but it looked like it hurt.

  “Let me ask you something,” I said. “You want to live your life like this?”

  “Like what?”

  “Scared, ashamed. Pretending whatever it is, it’s not a big deal.”

  “Not right now, Mr. Kel y.” The pleading edge in his voice tugged at the fabric of denial that lay bunched between us.

  “We’re gonna talk,” I said. “Later, for sure.”

  Hubert took a sip of his tea. “Can we do the case now?”
/>   I shook my head and gave him the bare bones. Most of it he had already picked up from the news.

  “We have one at least solid lead,” I said. “Guy dumped his rifle in an al ey after the shooting downtown.”

  “He never would have done that if it could have been traced, right?”

  “You’d be surprised at how careless these guys can get,” I said.

  “Guys?”

  “We think there are two people operating together.”

  “Can you tel me what you got on the rifle?”

  I shrugged. “Nothing yet. No prints. Feds are running a trace.”

  Hubert lifted his one good eyebrow. “Speaking of the feds, what do you think I can do that the FBI can’t?”

  “I know the Bureau,” I said. “They’re running al kinds of scenarios, working up a profile, comparing details of the crimes against other cases. Al the stuff you’d expect.”

  “Makes sense to me,” Hubert said. “Use your database to look for patterns.”

  “Yeah, but I’m thinking the guys we’re looking for might not fit any of the normal patterns. On top of that, the Bureau can’t do anything without discussing it for a day and a half. Meanwhile, these guys keep kil ing people.”

  Hubert didn’t look like he completely bought the logic, but there was enough there for him to be intrigued. “Do they know about me?”

  “I’l talk to the powers that be. Maybe get you some sort of consultant’s role.”

  “And if you can’t?”

  “It’s a free country, isn’t it?”

  Hubert grinned. It might have been my imagination, but it looked like the smile hurt a little less. “Do I get to carry a badge?”

  “No, Hubert. What you get to do is think outside the box. Develop an analysis modeled on factors no one else is taking into account.”